Shattered Hearts
by Annie Oakley
Summary: Icewing and Earthsong k'Tiyena must travel to k'Valdemar to try to get some extra mages, but they end up in the real Valdemar and secrets are let loose. One finds love and the other finds that she was never really part of the family at all.
1. Default Chapter

Shattered Hearts  
  
Disclaimer: I own all but the Last Herald-Mage characters. Members of the k'Tiyena Vale all belong to me.  
  
Chapter 1  
  
It was not the thrill of the hunt that send shivers down her back, nor the shriek of the gyrfalcon, but the feeling of satisfaction knowing she had gotten the prey first, and knowing what that meant for her.  
" Icewing! You knew that Devi has better day-sight than Vithi!" Earthsong whined, walking to her sister's side.  
Icewing tossed her thick black braid over her shoulder and whistled for Devi, the white gyrfalcon that she had bonded to years ago. Devi whistled back and alighted carefully on her wrist, the small rabbit in her mouth. Icewing coaxed Devi to let her have the rabbit and gave it to Earthsong.  
" So did you, sister-mine. Now give me what you promised on our little bet." Icewing's soft anber eyes sparkled as Earthsong drew the pendant over her head and slapped it into Icewing's waiting hand, taking the rabbit and stiflly walking away.  
Thank you, dear sister. Icewing thought as she walked sedately to her ekele to stash her new bauble. I would dearly love to wear this and flaunt it, but I have some Scouting to do.  
As drab as Icewing looked, she was a hoarder of beautiful things, mainly jewels and many ells of precious fabrics. Cabinets of decorations filled her ekele, and she even had a few of the more elaborate displayed on her walls. She would never put weapons up on her walls, those were either on her person or not at all, because if it were decorative it was useless to weild.  
The pendant she had won from her sister was a large emerald, enchanted to have a small mage-light in it when it was touched by its wearer.  
: Pretty. Will look pretty on Icewing.: Devi burbled in her head, now having hopped up to her shoulder.  
Devi was a large black and white gyr female. She was snowy white everywhere except for the black mask on her face and the edges of her wings, but those were fading day by day.  
" Yes, it would look rather remarkable with my black leathers." Icewing muttered to herself as she climbed the ladder to her home.  
  
Earthsong lightly made her way back to her ekele, hoping her mother didn't catch her. Usually when she did she asked where her daughter had been and then it turned into a big yelling fit, even though she didn't know exactly how.  
I'm 16, a year older than Icewing, and yet dear little Icewing gets to do whatever she wants! Mother should know better to treat me like a baby when she knows full well that the only reason why I don't put a full body bond on her is because she is my mother! Earthsong thought angrily.  
Unfortunately for her, her mother had seen her and advanced quickly, looking rather angry. Earthsong braced herself. Don't lose it again. Earthsong doubled her fists up under her sleeves and braced herself.  
" Where have you been? I do not remember telling you to shirk your duties!" Her mother said, calmly but loudly in front of half of the Scouts and a few hertasi.  
Earthsong steered herself away from the anger that she wanted to get out, telling herself that it would no do to explode here and now, even though she knew that it would throuroughly embarrass her mother. She looked straight into her mother's bright blue eyes and smiled, something that Featherfox had not expected from her daughter.  
" Give me something to do, and I will do it. But until you give me a duty, there is no way that I can shirk it. Goddess knows we need help with the shieilding." She said calmly, proudly tipping her head up and walking away with her mother staring after her like a wounded bird.  
  
That night there was a Council meeting, called by Featherfox. She had thought long and hard about what her oldest daughter had said to her, and had finally come to the fact that their shields were not the best and something needed to be done about it.  
" My daughter brought up an important point to me today." She said into the silence. " We need heavier sheilding, better sheilding."  
She knew that her words would cause arguements, but this time she was ready for them.  
" We simply don't have enough Adepts, and those are the only ones that we trust enough to do the shielding." Lightningsinger, an Adept himself, protested. " And the ones we do have are fixed on the Heartstone."  
" Our shields are just fine." Remarked Blazerunner lazily, trailing a ring of smoke from his pipe around his hands artfully.  
Featherfox barked a cynical laugh. " If our shielding were fine, then we would have known when that Changelion got in. If it were fine, we would have known when the twins decided to run away. If it were fine!" She banged her fist on the desk. " Then we wouldn't have to throw Adepts at the Heartstone to make it stop fluxxing!"  
She frowned at them sharply and could see her words finally starting to sink in, for the first time in five years. " They aren't protected against really strong magical attacks, not without the shield, and that is weakening. Face it, you are all failing your duties, the ones that you swore to uphold. k'Tiyena may yet become a dead clan because you oldsters didn't want to put our resources into use when we need them most!" She said solenmly, changeing the arguement.  
Now they were silent, something she had not expected from them. Looks of unease passed around and a few of them looked like they were in Mindspeech mode with someone, thought they came out of it quickly.  
" We should ask for help from other Clans." Spoke up Darksky, a young mage who had taken his fathers place on Council when he had died.  
Featherfox grinned at the young man, knowing that he was one of the ones that had been 'thrown' at the Heartstone on many occasions. He had his own Mindhealer to make sure he didn't go crazy, because in establishing a steady link for the Heartstone, they had to link Darksky directly to it. She knew they shouldn't have done it, but this had been done when she was merely a Scout, and not the Scoutleader that she was now. She was glad her words carried weight now.  
" Sounds like someone's been using thier brains for something other than designing new robes." Featherfox growled to get the rest of her comrades attention. " So we should. Who wants us to send a few volunteers to the other Clans?"  
Her question was met with a roar of approval that she had not thouht possible from the old windbags. She chuckled to herself and called the Council to dismissal, then walked to her ekele to have dinner and think about who they would send.  
  
Icewing ran to Earthsong's ekele, flying Devi up to let the ladder down and scrambling up it.  
" Earthsong! Mother's sending out people to other Clans to get help for the sheilding!" She crowed as she leapt up the last rung and pulled the ladder up with her. She leapt up the other smaller ladders to Earthsong's personal room, and found her sister packing a back full of clothes and other things. " Have you already heard then? Are you going?"  
Earthsong scowled at her little sister, ice blue eyes narrowing and her hands shoving a few strands of floor length silver hair back. " I'm not going with them. I'm running away, no go away and don't tell Mother anything."  
" You aren't going without me!" Icewing grabbed her sisters arms and pinned her to the wall.  
" Let me go Icewing." Her sister sounded tired and resigned, like she was finished fighting with her. " I'm going alone, and you cannot go with me, you have to go on the search party to find more Adepts."  
Icewing didn't let Earhtsong go, merely looked in her eyes for something that would help her deal with this. " But, why Earthsong?" Her voice was small and childish. " Why are you leaving?"  
" I went to Mother, to see if she would finally let me work with the shields. She said that I couldn't, and when I asked her if I could go to look for Adepts, she denied me that also. I don't know why she's trying to confine me to the Vale, but it's not going to work anymore. I have to get out of here!" Earthsong pushed Icewing off her and started packing again, closing the last bag and putting it under her bed.  
" If you're going, then I have to go with you!" Icewing said fiercely. " You know that you know nothing about the wilderness or anything outside the Vale. You need someone to protect you."  
Earthsong smiled and thought to herself. True, she let people know that she knew nothing, but she didn't spend all that time around the hertasi for nothing. She knew enough of tracking and survival to get her to another Clan, and she knew enough magics to protect her along the way. No one knew, but she had been the one who had killed the Changelion when it got in, even though it looked like Lightningsinger had gotten it.  
" It can't be this hard!" Earthsong admitted, hugging herself.  
" And it won't be." Featherfoxes voice said from the doorway.  
She strode in, her brown hawk sitting proudly on her shoulder, their mother's eyes burning brighter than they had ever seen. " I'm not going to allow this." She took her daughter's hands and held them, something she had not done in a long time. " The reason why I did not let you go with the others is because I wanted you to go with your sister, but you will not be going to another Clan. It is to Valdemar you will be going." 


	2. 2

Shattered Hearts  
  
Disclaimer: I own all but the Last Herald-Mage characters. Members of the k'Tiyena Vale all belong to me.  
  
Chapter 2  
  
" Can you believe it?" Earthsong asked her sister, flinging her arms wide into the sky as she breathed in the scent of the air around her. " Us, going to k'Valdemar!"  
Icewing let out the breath the she didn't know she had been holding in. " Of course I can believe it, aren't we living it?" She smiled as she realized that their mother had given them the most important job they had ever had. That anyone in the Vale had ever been sent on. If she hadn't been on her dyheli, she liked to think that she would have fainted.  
She pulled her braid over her shoulder and ran her hands over it, using her knees and feet to control the dyheli, even though she really didn't have to, it was smart enough to know where to go on its own. She was just nervous and scared. Nervous because she had never once been out of the Vale, at least not so far out that she would encounter other people. Scared that Earthsong would get them lost, or attacked. The girl really did not know how to be quiet.  
She also resented her sister, not knowing why she would get the attention in the first place. Like their mother had said, they could not afford any of the mages, and if they had let her, Earthsong could have set some of the more touchy shields that required to keep the Heartstone under control. Scouts were of no loss, but why send Earthsong? Icewing started to think that maybe her mother thought that she could not do it alone, didn't trust her enough on her own. Anger coursed through her as she kept on thinking these thoughts, then imagined little arrows sticking out of Earthsong's head, arrows from her bow.  
  
A/N: There will be more, I promise! I'm just suffering from a really big writer's block so a lot of my stuff is suffering as well. If you help me I will credit you.... 


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